What Causes Burnout And How We Can Avoid It

Sep 9

Written By Niamh G

Hi, my name is Niamh and I am about to go into my 3rd year of studying Medicine at Oxford. I'm a big advocate for maintaining a healthy attitude towards work as I know this can be difficult when pursuing a medical career!

So many of us have experienced that feeling of mental exhaustion coined ‘burnout’- but is this just an inevitable part of the many years of studying in Medical School? Absolutely not! In the case of burnout, prevention is definitely better than cure, so I have compiled a list of tips on how to survive and THRIVE at Medical School and avoid that dreaded burnout.

Firstly, we need to address what causes burnout and for most people, this is prolonged periods of stress. Stress is not just an emotion, but a physical body response characterised by increased circulating stress hormones. In the long term this has a number of health implications including decreased immunity, increased risk of many chronic diseases and (you guessed it) exhaustion – this in itself contributes to that feeling of ‘burnout’. But is all stress bad? Well, the answer is no, we need a certain level of stress to help us reach our optimum performance. It’s all about balance.

I have compiled a list of actionable steps you can implement to avoid the dreaded burnout:

1. Give yourself at least an hour in the morning of time - just for you.

This is so important for me that I give myself two hours. During this time, I don’t do any uni work and focus on relaxing, listening to a podcast and even going for a walk.

2. Be reasonable with your studying.

I was once told to write my to-do list in priority order and to cross off the 20% at the end of it. This ensures that you give yourself reasonable targets for the day but also complete important tasks.

3. Don’t feel guilty about your free time.

Schedule breaks and don’t feel guilty about taking them! Breaks are productive! You can only concentrate for a certain period of time before concentration starts to fall so take regular breaks.

4. Keep up your hobbies.

Do something you enjoy every day. This can be anything at all! However, don’t feel pressure to take on extracurriculars that don’t bring you joy – this will feel like another thing to tick off the list and contribute to that feeling of burnout.

5. Avoid comparing yourself to others.

This is particularly important with social media. You might see people posting stories of them studying well into the night, posts about how to work a ’13 hour day’ but in many cases, this isn’t reality. We are all different and the one thing I’ve learned is that I do much better when I focus on what I am doing and not other people. I encourage you to use social media mindfully. If a post makes you feel guilty then just unfollow that person, you don’t have to justify looking after your own wellbeing.

6. Study smart!

Minimise the time you spend working by working to learn. Use active recall and spaced repetition techniques and don’t spend hours on end writing notes. Lecture notes and online resources have done all that for you.